Judgement Day (5 page)

And there was
war in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon,
and the dragon and his angels fought back. But he was not strong
enough, and they lost their place in heaven. The great dragon was
hurled down — that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who
leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his
angels with him.

[Revelation
12:7-9]

I saw heaven
standing open and there before me was a white horse, whose rider is
called Faithful and True. With justice he judges and makes war. His
eyes are like blazing fire, and on his head are many crowns. He has
a name written on him that no-one knows but he himself. He is
dressed in a robe dipped in blood, and his name is the Word of God.
The armies of heaven were following him, riding on white horses and
dressed in fine linen, white and clean. Out of his mouth comes a
sharp sword with which to strike down the nations. “He will rule
them with an iron sceptre.” He treads the winepress of the fury of
the wrath of God Almighty. On his robe and on his thigh he has this
name written:

KING OF KINGS
AND LORD OF LORDS.

[Revelation
19:11-16]

That night,
the night I read the Book of Revelations for the first time, I had
a dream. I was in my old primary school. Jesus was standing in
front of me, he was smiling and I looked into his eyes, and he said
“Mick the Messiah, what a spinout, hey?” He pointed to the sky, and
there was what I always described as “a great white swirling body,”
in hindsight it was like a rotating spiral galaxy, that was God.
Next to God was an outline of the Devil in red, then lightning came
from God and destroyed the Devil. To me, that dream, it was like
Jesus was passing on the title of Messiah to myself. “I was the
Messiah, now it’s your turn.” You go through your life as an
ordinary person, and then suddenly you’re the Messiah, “what a
spinout, hey?” It was a total mind fuck. Even though Jesus is kind
of my nemesis these days, I’ll always remember that dream. I woke
up in the morning with a huge smile on my face. “Jesus had just
called me the Messiah, it’s my turn now.” I never used to remember
my dreams, but this was the most vivid and real dream I’d ever had
in my life, it was a dream that I will remember forever
. T
his was truly a dream from
God.

I had to get
out of the hospital, I thought that the best way would be to
convince them that I was the Messiah, “then they would have to let
me out!” It seemed so obvious to me, surely it should be obvious to
them too. I made friends with a young guy in there, he told me
“you’ve gotta know when to hold them and when to fold
them
.
” I heard what he
was saying, but I thought that I could convince these people of the
“truth.” Although I didn’t take his advice at the time, I did
listen to him in the end, and I’ll always remember that piece of
advice
he gave me
.

I was in that
hospital for two months, and over time the boredom and isolation
got the better of me. What started as “the thought police,” became
my prayers. Once I rid myself of all
of my angry
thoughts towards God, I began talking to
Him in my mind. I was never big on prayer,
being raised an atheist, but
since He knows
all of my thoughts, all that was necessary was for me to think
messages or conversations and send them to Him. What started out as
me imagining His replies in thought form became something where I
didn’t have to consciously imagine what He would say back, it would
just appear in my mind. I wasn’t well.

They finally
let me out when I begged them. I broke down in a group meeting and
told them I’ve got no one to talk to except the voices in my head,
I told them that I can’t take it anymore and I need to get out of
there. I never gave up on my beliefs while I was in the hospital,
but perhaps this was the first time I began to doubt my sanity.
They let me out not long after that.

Once I got out
of the hospital though, life was no picnic. I was still working on
saving the world. Every time I turned on the TV, it didn’t matter
what show I was watching, it seemed like God was talking to me. I
would pick out individual lines as messages from God. I was still
writing stuff about “I have created seven layers of heaven and
seven layers of hell,” but the Book of Revelations had changed
me.

After I read
the Book of Revelations in the hospital, I believed that it was my
mission to destroy all of the non-believers. I would threaten all
of the non-believers with hell, and post letters to the Pentagon
and the White House telling them to destroy India and the Middle
East, to drop atomic bombs on them and kill everyone because they
were evil sinners who worshipped false gods. I was trying to do
what God told me to do in the Book of Revelations, destroy the
world. I imagined the President in Washington reading my letters
and talking with his men, “what do we do about this guy? Do we do
what he tells us? He’s the Messiah, we have to!” In my mind there
was panic in Washington, and around the world. They knew that I was
here, and they knew that they had to destroy the world, but they
didn’t want to. They didn’t know what to do about me, but they knew
that I was the Messiah. I was here to start World War III, and they
knew it, but they wanted to wait and see if I’d reconsider. I used
to ask God, “which countries do you want me to destroy?” with a
smile on my face. Of course there was no answer, and I’d look at
the birthmark on my thigh, which is kind of in the shape of India,
and it’s hot, and I’d ask, “is that it God? Do you want me to
destroy India?” I thought that the heat from my birthmark signified
the fires of hell. When I thought that I was supposed to destroy
the world, I understood why God had chosen me. He had chosen me for
my lack of empathy. It made sense to me that destroying the world
was my mission.

But then there
was something else going on, something new had started to happen in
my mind. I had separated into two distinct personalities. Because
of the medication I was on, I had become distant from God. I could
no longer feel Him surrounding me, I could no longer feel that beam
of light shining down upon me, or hear the angels singing in
heaven. My new, other personality came out when I smoked pot. The
normal me was weak, obedient to God, fearful of God, distant from
God, and small. I was the guy who was supposed to destroy the
world, the guy who had to do whatever God told him to do.
I named my new personality “The
Leader.”
The Leader didn’t give a fuck about the Bible, The
Leader didn’t give a fuck about the Book of Revelations, or
anything else in the Bible! “I’m here now, we can get rid of this
stupid fucking book!” People like Moses, or Jesus, they were as
nothing to The Leader! The Leader was the all-powerful, absolute
King of Heaven and Earth
! He
answered to no one!

I would smoke
pot and I would realise what I had been saying, it all became real.
I was trying to destroy the fucking world! What the fuck happened
to me?! If I did that, I would be the Antichrist! I’ve been acting
like the most evil man on the planet, sending letters to the
President telling him to destroy half the world
!
Then I would change my ideas, from death
and destruction and most of the world going to hell, and I would
desperately send a new letter telling him that everyone is going to
heaven! I was so worried that they were really going to bomb
everyone, I had to get the new letter sent off quickly! I’d write
stuff about monkeys and dolphins and whales going to heaven, then
I’d think, why don’t I just send all of the animals to heaven?! I
would write it down, and then I would see it in my mind, all of the
animals playing around in heaven! I also imagined Hitler burning at
millions of degrees in hell. He was my only occupant in hell,
although I was preparing a place for bin Laden, and I had this
invisible knob with which I could turn the heat up and down on
Hitler. I would see it in my mind, Hitler’s relief when I turned it
down, and his pain when I turned it back up. I had planned to give
my Jewish friend Adam a turn playing with the knob too. I thought
he’d like that, although he wouldn’t be able to see Hitler in his
mind like I could.

Slowly The
Leader’s influence would begin fade, and I would start thinking
that I had to do everything the Bible said again, and destroy the
world and send all the sinners to hell. It was an internal
struggle, made more difficult by the fact that it became very
difficult for me to buy pot because none of my friends would sell
it to me anymore. I would beg people for pot, I needed it to become
The Leader, but most of the time they wouldn’t let me have it.

The last time
I hung out with Ben was when he came over and I asked him if he
wanted to meet The Leader, he said “I’d very much like to meet The
Leader.” It didn’t go quite as planned, we smoked pot and then I
started crying and saying “just because I think I’m heaps shit,
I’ve been made heaps powerful.” I had read this line in the Bible
where Jesus says “all those who humble themselves will be exalted,
and all those who exalt themselves will be humbled.” I would say to
myself “I’m so humble, I’m just a nobody,” all the while claiming
to have powers over heaven and hell, and trying to destroy the
world, and then get goosebumps and tremble and feel my power
increasing. Of course it was silly, I wasn’t being “humble” at all.
I only saw Ben briefly once more after that, when he let me get
some pot off him. He didn’t want anything more to do with me after
that, I had made a fool of myself.

I believed
that Britney Spears was my virgin. I believed that Britney Spears
was created for me, although I did question God’s taste in women,
and I didn’t like the idea of God telling me who I should marry
(because what would He know,
right?)
. I’ve never been into pop music, but when I tried to
think of a more attractive woman, I drew a blank.

I also thought
that Bill Gate’s money was saved up for me, and that was why there
was this super-rich guy in the world
.
T
hat
was my money, I was going to take all of his money off him and
leave him penniless! Ha! I was asking my mum how much of his money
she wanted
?
I wanted her
to know that I’ll take care of her, that she’ll never have to work
again. I nicknamed Bill “Never Getting Through The Pearly” Gates.
Stupid rich jerk.

One night a
few weeks after I got out of the hospital my parents were out for
the night. I smoked some pot, I think it must have been the pot I
got from Ben, and I drank some Wild Turkey on my own. I started
panicking, I was really freaking out! I started freaking out
thinking terrorists were going to kill me. I ended up cowering in
the toilet, the smallest and coolest room in the house, trying to
get away from their heat seeking missiles, desperately calling the
police
and
asking them
to protect me. The police came around but they didn’t do anything,
they just talked to me for a few minutes and then left. Then mum
came home and I had her drive me to the police station. I begged
the police to lock me in a cell for the night to keep me safe from
people trying to kill me. Then we went up to the hospital, and I
could feel my body burning from all of the things I had been saying
about destroying the world. I felt like I was going to go to hell
and I could already feel the heat consuming me from the inside. I
was terrified
!
I wanted
scissors to cut out the word “bastard” from a t-shirt I was wearing
that said “Bastard Squad,” because I didn’t want to be a sinner.
I’ve never felt the fear of hell like that ever in my life. Hell is
a scary place. When you truly believe that you are going to burn in
hell, there is no other fear like it. I sent
my
final letter to the Pentagon, it
was a
handwritten
note
on a scrap of
paper. It read “I’m a monster,” and nothing else. “They would know
who sent it to them.”

I was really
heavily sedated for a long time. I told my psychiatrist Dr Pusic
how I was so tired that I couldn’t do anything, and he would deny
that the drugs were sedating. This made me believe that it wasn’t
something I would ever get better from, it made me believe that my
brain was just fucked, that I would never be able to get out of bed
again, that my life was over. I spent the next year and a half
sleeping twelve hours a night and having a nap in the afternoon. I
tried going back to university, but I couldn’t do it. I really
struggled making it through a shift at work too, but my bosses were
quite nice to me and let me go home if I needed to.

At home, my
parents were shit. Every time I walked in the room Ken would say
things, he would mutter names like “fuckwit,” “dickhead,”
“arsehole.” Mum would ask why I’m always in my room, she would tell
me that I smell, that my face looks bad, that I’m walking too
heavily, that I’m lazy. She would have family photos taken and tell
me how I ruin the picture. I would look around the hallway at the
family photos and at how I didn’t fit in to this family. I felt
like they weren’t really my family, that God was my real family,
and these people just raised me, like I was adopted by this family.
I would cover up myself in the pictures and look at the family
without me, because I thought that soon I would be dead.

One time when
I mentioned my universe theory around Ken, he said “bullshit
theory,” I’ve never been so insulted in my life. These people just
wouldn’t believe that I was an intelligent guy. Could you imagine
if Einstein’s parents had heard him mention his theory of
Relativity and said “theory of bullshit”
?
It’s just fucked, I’ve always been a
smart guy, and then suddenly everything I say is bullshit. I really
just wanted someone to believe me, so my thoughts turned to my
father, and how he used to compare me to Isaac Newton when I was a
kid.